subject: How to find Niche Markets [print this page] You cannot be and sell everything to everybody. Sometimes it's much wiser to identify your area of expertise, become an expert in that area, and then make a name for yourself in that niche.
This will not be possible for every person reading this article but for most people selling a product or service, the following exercise is worth doing.
To find out if you can develop niche markets you need to know and understand your product or service and which of your clients' needs it satisfies.
This exercise is only possible if you have existing clients.
Create a form with 30 to 50 lines and about 6 to 8 columns and write into the left column your top 30 to 50 customers. Fill in the headings of the remaining columns with age, sex, occupation, education, hobbies/interests or anything else that might be relevant and what these customers may have in common. If you sell to companies fill in the headings with the size of company, location, need fulfilled etc. Then go down the list and fill in the details for each customer. Once you have finished look at the list and see if there are any certain common traits within your list. You might recognize that you mainly sell to small companies in a certain area fulfilling mainly one particular need. Or you might sell to women in their 40's with high school children. Through this exercise you will identify at least on if not more than one of your niche markets. The next question is, where else can you find people or companies with these characteristics?
If you find the answer to this question you just created a whole new target market. It is proven that marketing to niche markets results in bigger sales and more profits than putting your efforts into marketing to a larger market segment.
